Theory

Into love and out again,
Thus I went, and thus I go.
Spare your voice, and hold your pen-
Well and bitterly I know
All the songs were ever sung,
All the words were ever said;
Could it be, when I was young,
Some one dropped me on my head?


Then I Would Love You

Were you to come,
With your clear, gray eyes
As calmly placid as, in summer's heat,
At noontide lie the sultry skies;
With your dark, brown hair
As smoothly quiet as the leaves
When stirs no cooling breath of air;
And shorn of smile, your full, red lips
Prest firmly close as the chaliced bud,
Before the nectar-quaffing bee ere sips;
I would not know you.
I would not love you.

But should you come
With your love-bright eyes
Dancing gaily as, on summer's eve,


Theme with Variations

I never loved a dear Gazelle--
Nor anything that cost me much:
High prices profit those who sell,
But why should I be fond of such?
To glad me with his soft black eye
My son comes trotting home from school;
He's had a fight but can't tell why--
He always was a little fool!

But, when he came to know me well,
He kicked me out, her testy Sire:
And when I stained my hair, that Belle
Might note the change and this admire

And love me, it was sure to dye
A muddy green, or staring blue:


Thekla - A Spirit Voice

Whither was it that my spirit wended
When from thee my fleeting shadow moved?
Is not now each earthly conflict ended?
Say,--have I not lived,--have I not loved?

Art thou for the nightingales inquiring
Who entranced thee in the early year
With their melody so joy-inspiring?
Only whilst they loved they lingered here.

Is the lost one lost to me forever?
Trust me, with him joyfully I stray
There, where naught united souls can sever,
And where every tear is wiped away.


The Wreckage

Love lit a beacon in thine eyes,
And I out in the storm,
And lo! the night had taken wings;
I dream me safe and warm.
Love lit a beacon in thine eyes,
A wreckers' light for me;
My heart is broken on the rocks;
I perish in the sea.


The Women of Denmark

BRETHREN, join the social measure,
Sing our sister-Danes beloved,
While round each eye bedimmed with pleasure
Swims the form his youth approved.
And tell me not, that, cold to beauty,
Ye feel not yet her thrilling eye:
The heart that 's fit for friendship's duty
Is fit for gentle woman's tie.

Hence away, the man who wringeth
The soft heart on him bestowed;
Who, where love its fragrance flingeth,
Turns to thorns the flowery road!


The Woefull Lamentation Of Jane Shore

The woefull lamentation of Jane Shore, a goldsmith's wife in London, sometime king Edward IV. his concubine. To the tune of 'Live with me,' &c.

If Rosamonde, that was so faire,
Had cause her sorrowes to declare,
Then let Jane Shore with sorrowe sing,
That was beloved of a king.
Then maids and wives in time amend,
For love and beauty will have end.

In maiden yeares my beautye bright
Was loved dear of lord and knight;
But yet the love that they requir'd,
It was not as my friends desir'd.


The Wish

I shed my tears; my tears – my consolation;
And I am silent; my murmur is dead,
My soul, sunk in a depression’s shade,
Hides in its depths the bitter exultation.
I don’t deplore my passing dream of life --
Vanish in dark, the empty apparition!
I care only for my love’s infliction,
And let me die, but only die in love!


The Wine of God's Love

Drunk with tile wine of divine love
I am oblivious of all.
Abandoning the mosque my leader comes this way
I hear him call.
At the end of worldlines,
For my prayers and fasting
I seek not of God
Heaven's blessings.
As Qais loved Laili
And the world forgot,
As Farhad loved Shirin
And the world remembered not,
So do I love my God
With whom I have merged my lot.
The moth is not afraid of being burnt to death


The Wind of Sorrow

The fire of love was burning, yet so low
That in the dark we scarce could see its rays,
And in the light of perfect-placid days
Nothing but smouldering embers dull and slow.
Vainly, for love's delight, we sought to throw
New pleasures on the pyre to make it blaze:
In life's calm air and tranquil-prosperous ways
We missed the radiant heat of long ago.

Then in the night, a night of sad alarms,
Bitter with pain and black with fog of fears,
That drove us trembling to each other's arms --


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